Chapter 1: The Thirty-Third Summon

“Lee Doha.”

It was a languid afternoon. The early autumn breeze felt fresh, the sunlight was warm, and a comfortable fullness settled in the stomach. Such a day, sitting in a lecture hall, invited an irresistible drowsiness that made one’s head droop in sleepy nods. Lee Doha was no exception.

Unable to fight the overwhelming urge to sleep, he propped his chin on his hand, vigorously dozing off. A sharp poke to his side startled him awake.

“……”

Silence reigned, as if a mouse had died. Slowly, Lee Doha lowered the hand that had supported his chin, biting his lip. ‘I know this atmosphere.’ The professor, standing at the podium, regarded him with a peculiar gaze, and every single eye in the room was fixed on him. A few people were even holding up their phones.

And, beneath his feet, a vivid blue light pulsed.

‘Ah, I know this all too well.’ Lee Doha slowly cast his gaze downwards. Directly beneath the chair where he sat, on the classroom floor, a brilliant blue summon circle had unfurled.

This was the thirty-second summoning.

“Haa…”

Lee Doha buried his face in his dry hands, exhaling a profound sigh. A tap on his knuckles made him lift his head, only to see Yoon Hyung offering him a cigarette. Upon taking it, Yoon Hyung kindly extended a lighter as well. Lee Doha accepted it without hesitation and lit the cigarette.

While he knew how to smoke, he never bought cigarettes with his own money, so he couldn’t truly be called a smoker. Yet, at times like these, a cigarette felt utterly necessary.

He drew deeply on the pristine white filter, then exhaled with a whoosh, watching the smoke dissipate and vanish into the clear autumn sky. His head spun faintly from the unaccustomed nicotine. ‘Ughhh,’ Lee Doha groaned, a desolate sound.

Yoon Hyung, standing before him, puffed on his own cigarette while scrolling through his phone.

“Even the heavens would be moved by such devotion. Why not just meet them once and for all?”

“I refuse.”

“Then you’ll just have to remain a celebrity.”

“What?”

Yoon Hyung held out his phone. Lee Doha, assuming it was just another SNS post on E-Space or Orca—given these occurrences were hardly new—clapped a hand over his mouth. The hand pointing at the screen trembled uncontrollably.

“Crazy… is this news?”

“Online news. Though, yes, it did make it to the main news as well.”

“Give it here.”

“Whoa, you’re going to throw it.”

Lee Doha snatched the phone.

A summon circle opened during class in a lecture hall at XX University in Seoul. The protagonist of the summon circle is identified as Mr. Lee (24), known as Asia’s sole Insodouble. This is not the first instance of Mr. Lee causing a summon circle to appear in a public place.

On the 13th, a summon circle opened inside an elevator at Gangnam H Department Store, causing a woman in her 50s to faint; this incident was also attributed to Mr. Lee. Additionally, on the 2nd of last month, a summon circle appeared in a market, leading to a public evacuation.

The Korean branch of the International ESP Research Agency (IERA) has stated that it is closely monitoring the situation. IERA firmly asserts that, unless one is the summoned specialist, third parties will not be caught within a summon circle, assuaging many public concerns. However, anxieties are not expected to subside easily.

Calls for regulations on summon circles appearing in public places are growing louder. Nevertheless, experts maintain that opening a summon circle is solely the prerogative of a summoner residing in Oz, and there is virtually no method to prevent such occurrences.

Copyright Faster News. Unauthorized redistribution prohibited.

Comments: 381

LOL that’s insane

What’s the reporter doing? Just use his name or don’t call him a Double. Are they playing peek-a-boo?

Anyone can tell it’s L D H

Wow, look at that class. The summon circle is seriously radiant.

Rank has nothing to do with the summon circle, idiot.

Is L D H on bad terms with his summoner? He never goes.

L D H isn’t a contractor. With his class, if he’d contracted, it would’ve been worldwide news already.

Yep, contract refusal.

??

It’s not uncommon, but a lot of people don’t know. Many espers refuse contracts.

Honestly, if it were me too. It sounds nice, but isn’t it a s*ave contract?

What are you talking about

If you stay quiet, you’d be halfway there.

Tsk tsk tsk tsk.

If L D H contracts, the political situation in Oz will be completely overturned.

This is truly undeniable.

Just one contract with L D H would probably sustain our country. No need for power plants. We’d become an oil nation.

Agreed.

Overreacting.

Agreed, L D H could do it.

L D H’s class could do it. Ursula sustains Germany, so what? Our country is tiny, L D H’s class is more than enough. We could even export.

But why doesn’t he?

It’s his choice.

Who’s Ursula?

Ugh, your ignorance is overflowing.

But seriously, they need to find a way. They always say there’s no way, no way, but if they’re just going to say that, what are they researching with all that money? I was there during that elevator incident, and seriously, I almost fainted. I was so shocked. They say ordinary people won’t get pulled in or affected, but when you experience it yourself, it’s different. That lady didn’t faint for no reason. I still get cold sweats thinking about it.

You’re overreacting. I have a friend who’s a contractor, and I’ve stood on a summon circle a few times. It wasn’t that scary. My friend says it feels like being pulled in, but I didn’t feel anything like that. It just looked like a pretty drawing on the floor.

What friend

But that sounds right. Getting unexpectedly caught up in it is different from being with a friend.

L D H is supposed to be super handsome.

Yep, handsome. I see him sometimes because he’s at our school, and he’s sharply handsome. I thought he was short, but he’s surprisingly tall, small face, long limbs, celebrity proportions.

Whether he’s handsome or not, does it matter?

If L D H were a contractor, he’d already have a fan club and be a huge dealㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ He’d totally dominate Oh Han-ulㅋㅋㅋㅋ

L D H has a fan club though.

Lee Doha looked up sharply.

“I have a fan club?”

Yoon Hyung let out a weary sigh, gently retrieving the phone from Lee Doha’s half-dazed grasp.

“My friend. That’s not humility. That’s called ignorance.”

“Since when?”

“It’s been a while, I think. They said it exploded after that supermarket summon circle video went viral last time, remember?”

“……”

‘But why didn’t I know?’ Lee Doha asked, utterly dumbfounded. Yoon Hyung regarded him with a slightly pitiful look, steadily puffing on his cigarette. He explained that while videos spread and more people knew him, Lee Doha was still a normal person, not a celebrity.

It was typical for fan clubs dedicated to ordinary individuals to operate among themselves, without giving gifts or stalking their object of admiration. Yoon Hyung’s words made sense.

“News travels fast these days. So just go, meet them, and clear things up. Tell them, ‘I have no intention of contracting. Don’t summon me.’”

Lee Doha merely smoked in silence. In that brief moment, he felt as though he had aged ten years, utterly exhausted. The needlessly bright weather only exacerbated his disquiet. This was the thirty-second time, nearly half a year had passed.

He doubted meeting them would change anything, given their unwavering persistence despite his constant disregard. He would be fortunate if he didn’t get caught up in something even worse.

Espers, contractors. It had been barely a hundred years since these phenomena had fully emerged into the world. Espers, now termed ‘specialists,’ had slowly, cautiously permeated human society, much like ink bleeding into rice paper. A pivotal incident had instantly reshaped public perception of those with abilities, and contractors had then exploded into public consciousness with the dazzling impact of fireworks.

It was astonishingly easy to transform fear into admiration. The world erupted in fervent cheers and enthusiasm for the tales of another realm, brought by individuals wielding bizarre powers—lifting objects with a mere thought, soaring through the air, conjuring flames, or deflecting bullets with bare hands. It must have felt like watching a fantasy or superhero movie unfold before their very eyes.

Such was the absurdly swift transformation. The world changed before anyone could fully grasp it. The fears of oppression and persecution that those with abilities had once harbored seemed to dissipate with an almost hollow ease.

Lee Doha was born into this transformed, ‘easy’ world. Perhaps because of this, abilities held no particular significance for him. After being diagnosed as a specialist at the age of eight, he was constantly called hither and thither, leaving him no time to play—it was simply an annoyance.

Eventually, irritated, he behaved like a contrarian, doing his utmost to conceal his powers. By the time he was eighteen, his abilities had matured alongside him, making them impossible to hide. Lee Doha was a man utterly devoid of ambition. The IERA research lab, which demanded his monthly attendance, and the curious gazes that followed him everywhere, were nothing but bothersome.

His abilities were merely a convenience, a safety net ensuring he wouldn’t starve even if he abandoned his studies and failed to enter university. That was the extent of it. Born into an ordinary family, he had studied normally, attended university normally, and intended to continue living his life in precisely the same ordinary manner.

He had absolutely no desire, not even a speck, to film an SF movie in some foreign world he knew nothing about. Of course, becoming a contractor would mean untold riches, but there was no such thing as a free lunch in this world, and wealth always came with its own set of reasons and demands. Lee Doha’s materialism was perfectly average.

Thus, even if this unknown summoner from another world tried to summon him two hundred times, not just thirty-two—whether he was eating, shopping, attending lectures, sleeping, or even defecating—Lee Doha harbored not a single, solitary iota of intention to comply.

“?”

Until he encountered a summon circle flashing not blue, but a brilliant, vivid red.

“What is this?”

He had been on his way to dispose of the trash. Lee Doha, casually dressed in training pants and a zip-up jacket, stood utterly dumbfounded at the entrance of his villa, trash bag still in hand. A pedestrian passing by reacted similarly, letting out a gasp and thrusting out their phone. ‘Don’t film,’ he growled, and they sheepishly lowered it.

Ignoring the passerby, who remained rooted to the spot, muttering in confusion, Lee Doha tried to ignore the summon circle as well. He had never heard of a red summon circle. Specialists, who could become contractors at any time, were required to undergo contract-related education, but Lee Doha had been too busy sleeping through it.

Lectures about dimensions and wavelengths were even more tedious than his daily university classes.

‘I’ll just ignore it as always, throw out the trash, and go back,’ he thought nonchalantly. It was the moment he took a step forward with that thought.

The ground abruptly gave way beneath him, and his heart leaped into his throat. The red-patterned summon circle erupted like a magnificent fountain, its vibrant tendrils of light shooting upwards to fill his entire vision. In the sudden sensation of falling, Lee Doha squeezed his eyes shut, unable to even scream. His breath hitched in his chest.

Through his barely open eyes, he caught a fleeting glimpse of the pedestrian, mouth agape, pressed against the villa wall. The last thing he saw was the lingering image of the summon circle, crumbling like red ash, shattering and scattering into the starless night sky. His vision turned utterly black, then, like passing through a tunnel, it became blindingly white. An overwhelming metallic stench then assaulted his nostrils.

It was a truly terrible, acrid odor, as if rusty iron skewers had been jammed into both his nostrils. Reflexively, Lee Doha clamped a hand over his nose, suppressing the rising nausea that threatened to make him gag. ‘Did someone fillet five hundred fish?’ He was about to voice his irritation, but his vision, which had been blindingly white, calmly settled, revealing the scene before him, and he nearly bit his tongue.

He felt the blood drain from his head to his toes like an ebbing tide, leaving his face utterly pale.

A vast, opulent chamber, as sprawling as a stadium, was entirely awash in blood. The terrible stench was, in fact, the reek of blood. Over the fresh, scarlet rivulets, a colossal summon circle glowed crimson, shimmering like dancing flames. In its very center stood Lee Doha, and before him, his summoner—the very individual who had summoned him for the thirty-third time.

The man, with long, smooth platinum-blonde hair trailing all the way to the floor, offered a faint smile. His golden eyes, perfectly matching the color of his hair, curved neatly.

“Hello.”

He was already covering his mouth, yet Lee Doha was utterly speechless. Even without the nauseating stench of blood and the dizzying, blood-soaked spectacle, he would have been stunned into covering his mouth. The man was incredibly handsome, but his handsomeness was somewhat overshadowed by an extreme pallor that rendered him almost indistinguishable from his brilliant platinum hair.

It was, of course, entirely understandable. All the blood in his body seemed to have spilled onto the floor. He looked as though he were on the verge of death from massive blood loss, yet he greeted Lee Doha so casually, sending an involuntary shiver down Lee Doha’s spine.

“…Crazy.”

“Finally, I see your face. You’re quite handsome.”

“…Is he insane?”

“This insane man is about to die. Will you save him?”